Friday, December 7, 2018

A Royal Hue: 'Living Coral' Crowned Color Of The Year For 2019
As December draws its darkest hours ever longer, inching moment by
moment toward the shortest day of the year — in the northern hemisphere,
at least — the Pantone Color Institute is striking a defiant tone. The
global experts in hue have crowned "living coral" as their annual color
of the year for 2019. You can also call it by its official Pantone code,
16-1546 — though admittedly that doesn't have quite the same ring to
it. It would also miss the point, in a way, since the institute selected
the color for its "vibrant, yet mellow" life-affirming qualities — both
our physical lives and those we lead online. "Representing the fusion
of modern life, PANTONE Living Coral is a nurturing color that appears
in our natural surroundings and at the same time, displays a lively
presence within social media," the institute explained in a release
Wednesday. Colin Dwyer reports. (NPR)

Trump Rule Would Limit E.P.A.’s Control Over Water Pollution
The Trump administration is expected to put forth a proposal on Tuesday
that would significantly weaken a major Obama-era regulation on clean
water, according to a talking points memo from the Environmental
Protection Agency that was distributed to White House allies this week.
The Obama rule was designed to limit pollution in about 60 percent of
the nation’s bodies of water, protecting sources of drinking water for
about a third of the United States. It extended existing federal
authority to limit pollution in large bodies of water, like the
Chesapeake Bay and Puget Sound, to smaller bodies that drain into them,
such as tributaries, streams and wetlands. But it became a target for
rural landowners, an important part of President Trump’s political base,
since it could have restricted how much pollution from chemical
fertilizers and pesticides could seep into water on their property.
Coral Davenport reports. (NY Times)

Global warming today mirrors conditions during Earth’s largest extinction event: UW study
More than two-thirds of life on earth died off some 252 million years
ago, in the largest mass extinction event in Earth’s history.
Researchers have long suspected that volcanic eruptions triggered “the
Great Dying,” as the end of the Permian geologic period is sometimes
called, but exactly how so many creatures died has been something of a
mystery. Now scientists at the University of Washington and Stanford
believe their models reveal how so many animals were killed, and they
see frightening parallels in the path our planet is on today. Models of
the effects of volcanic greenhouse-gas releases showed the earth warming
dramatically and oxygen disappearing from its oceans, leaving many
marine animals unable to breathe, according to a study published
Thursday in the peer-reviewed journal Science. By the time
temperatures peaked, about 80 percent of the oceans’ oxygen, on average,
had been depleted. Most marine animals went extinct. Evan Bush reports.
(Seattle Times)

Trump Plans Major Rollback of Sage Grouse Protections to Spur Oil Exploration
The Trump administration on Thursday published documents detailing its
plan to roll back Obama-era protections for the vast habitat of the
greater sage grouse, a chickenlike bird that roams across nearly 11
million acres in 10 oil-rich Western states. The earlier proposal to
protect the bird, whose waning numbers have brought it close to
endangerment, was put forth under the Interior Department in 2015 and
set out to ban or sharply reduce oil and gas drilling in 10.7 million
acres of its habitat. The Trump plan, by contrast, would limit the
grouse’s protected habitat to just 1.8 million acres, essentially
opening up nine million acres of land to drilling, mining and other
development. Coral Davenport reports. (NY Times)

E.P.A. Will Ease Path to New Coal Plants
The Trump administration is poised to roll back a significant climate
change regulation on coal-fired power plants, making it easier to build
new coal plants in the United States. The Environmental Protection
Agency is expected to announce the plan on Thursday, according to four
people familiar with the administration’s proposal who were not
authorized to speak about it publicly. The proposal will eliminate
Obama-era restrictions on newly built coal plants that in effect
required them to include systems to capture the carbon dioxide they
produced — a technology that is still not in use on a commercial scale.
The replacement measure eases those constraints, sending a powerful
signal to the coal industry, as well as to other countries struggling
with the political difficulties of addressing climate change, that the
United States is trying to pave the way for coal-burning plants. Lisa
Friedman reports. (NY Times)

Federal whale-saving efforts threaten Vancouver Island livelihoods, say group
Federal government efforts to save threatened southern resident killer
whales could endanger the survival of communities on Vancouver Island
whose economies depend on sport fishing and tourism revenues, a
coalition of tourism, business and recreational fishing groups said
Thursday. About two dozen leaders gathered at a popular sport fishing
marina near Victoria to warn the federal government almost 10,000 jobs
are at stake as well as the futures of several cities, towns and
villages on the Island that base their incomes on fishing and tourism.
The coalition calls itself Thriving Orcas, Thriving Communities and said
the federal government has extended a 5,000 square kilometre critical
habitat zone off the southwest coast of Vancouver Island that could
result in fishing closures to protect the whales, whose population
stands at 74. Dirk Meissner reports. (Canadian Press)

Fraser River chinook critical to orcas are in steep decline, new research shows
Fraser River chinook, one of the most important food sources for
southern resident killer whales, are in steep decline and should be
listed for protection as an endangered species, a Canadian independent
science committee has announced. The Committee on the Status of
Endangered Wildlife in Canada, an independent advisory board to the
Canadian federal government, issued a grim list of species at risk of
extinction this month. Among the animals are some of the most beloved in
Canada, from its biggest bear, the polar bear, to its biggest salmon —
chinook. The decline of chinook in the Fraser and its largest tributary,
the Thompson River, over just three generations is so steep some runs
are at historic lows, others have dwindled to just a few hundred fish,
and others cratered by more than 50 percent. Lynda Mapes reports.
(Seattle Times)

Monique Keiran: Glass sponges are worthy candidates for protection
A friend tells me that, back in the 1970s, he used to dive in Saanich
Inlet to visit a local reef. He says it was spectacular. It included
strange, pillowy sponges and a community of shrimps, crabs, fish and
other critters. But, he says, the reef vanished decades ago. With the
critters gone and any remains buried under 40 years of sediment, it
would be difficult to determine if the reef had been one of B.C.’s
now-iconic glass-sponge reefs. With hard tissues made of tiny shards of
silicate minerals — glass — the sponges are extremely fragile. A crab
pot dragged across a reef, for example, can shatter the sponges into
smithereens. Equipment from a bottom trawler can plow swathes through
them. Long thought to be extinct, living glass-sponge reefs were
discovered in the deep waters of Hecate Strait and Queen Charlotte Sound
in the late 1980s. Scientists have since located glass-sponge reefs in
shallower waters in Howe Sound, off Tsawwassen and Parksville, and off
Bowen, Mayne, Galiano and Gabriola islands, and in Chatham Sound near
Prince Rupert. Similar reefs have also been found in Alaska’s Lynn Canal
and off Washington state. Monique Keiran writes. (Times Colonist)

After 12 years of more talk than action, work on Bellingham's central waterfront is finally underway
AT ONE OF the many new local brewpubs — locals stopped counting after
the first dozen — wisecracking skeptics up in the Fourth Corner might be
tempted to write off the spendy, long-delayed Bellingham waterfront
redevelopment project as a cruel joke, sprung on graying-hippie local
residents by fleeing captains of industry: “Want your precious natural
waterfront, free of our toxins (and jobs), to remake on your own terms,
in your own greenie image? Knock yourselves out, kids.” Most of the
redevelopment work is still in the works, but even now, residents
actually can access Bellingham Bay. Ron Judd writes. (Seattle Times)

If you like to watch: Plastic Free Salish Sea
Carl Davis's new video about what it takes to make the Salish Sea
plastic free. Produced for the San Juan County Marine Resources
Committee. (20:37) See also: The Riddle of the Roaming Plastics
It is one of the modern world’s biggest mysteries—99 percent of the
plastics that enter the ocean are missing. Matthew Halliday reports.
(Hakai Magazine)

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Salish Sea Communications provides communications and public relations services that raise visibility and engage audiences. Drawing on over 30 years experience in private, public and not-for-profit work, Mike Sato brings to you his skills and insights in developing and carrying out your print, electronic and social media projects and products. "I've been in the communications business since 1977 starting with community weekly newspapers then working for Seattle City Light, the Puget Sound Water Quality Authority, Hawaiian Electric Company and, for 20 years, People For Puget Sound." Salish Sea Communications: Truth Well Told. WA State UBI #601395482